


Unseen Connections

by Diary



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Aunt-Nephew Relationship, Bechdel Test Fail, Conversations, Family, Friendship/Love, Gen, Gen Fic, Gringotts Wizarding Bank, POV Male Character, POV Nonhuman, POV Original Character, Post-Order of the Phoenix, Pre-Half-Blood Prince
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-31
Updated: 2016-03-31
Packaged: 2018-05-30 08:41:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6416698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Diary/pseuds/Diary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Repost. Luna opens an account at Gringotts. Complete.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unseen Connections

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own Harry Potter.
> 
> Author’s Notes: Bornuk’s an original character of mine who first appeared in my Oak series and has been in several of my other fics. He and Augusta Longbottom are who good friends who routinely argue with, insult, and threaten bodily harm against one another.

Depositing a knut in the pouch, Bornuk offers the delivery owl a lemon sherbet. “Thank you.”

After she’s accepted and flown off, he opens the package, smiles at the picture of Neville waving his wand and causing a rainbow of colour to briefly appear,  and realises with pride,  _Neville’s growing into quite the young wizard._

He taps the picture to send it to his vault. He’d like to put it and several others on his desk, but to do so wouldn’t be appropriate. He’ll have to make do with keeping them at home.

When he goes out to his podium, he immediately spots a strange looking child entering. She’s around Neville’s age, perhaps a bit younger, and shares the boy’s skin colour, though, a paler shade of it. Her long, higgledy-piggledy hair is almost white, and even from the distance he can make out the larger than normal shape of her eyes. Rather than robes she’s wearing an overlarge white, medium-sleeved shirt with splotches of paint on it and thin, black trousers, too thick to be tights, and worryingly, no shoes or socks.

Seeing one of the guards is approaching her, he quickly goes over. “Hello, miss,” he greets. “My name is Bornuk. Is there anything I can help you with?”

In a far-off voice matching her expression, she greets, “Oh, hello. Are you a teller? I was wondering about opening an account, you see.”

“Yes, miss,” he answers. “If you’ll come to my office, I believe we can discuss it.”

She gives him a vague smile. “Thank you." Offering her hand, she continues, “My name is Luna Lovegood, though, many people call me Loony.”

 _There’s this mad girl who’s in Harry’s club with me,_ he remembers Neville telling him, _but I’m always careful to never call her loony. She’s alright, I reckon, once you get used to her._

Shaking her hand, he replies, “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Miss Lovegood. This way, please.”

She semi-skips alongside him.

They get to his office, and he motions to the chairs. “Please, have a seat. Would you care for some tea or pumpkin juice?”

“Some pumpkin juice would be lovely, thank you.”

“Has anyone come with you, Miss Lovegood? Children are only allowed to open an account of their own with guardian consent or a special order from the ministry.”

“Is that a ministry mandate or a majority decision of the goblin shareholders,” she inquires.

Surprised, he answers, “Interestingly, it’s both. I’m sure you’re aware the goblin employees rarely pay much attention to what the ministry says about the running of the bank, but in some instances, the shareholders do find themselves agreeing with the ministry on certain things. 30 years ago, the shareholders met with the head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and several of its senior officers, and six out of the ten shareholders agreed that there should be limits in regards to children under the age of seventeen. In the rare cases, we will accept a ministry order in place of guardian consent.”

“That’s very interesting,” she says. “I have a note from my father.” Withdrawing her wand from behind her ear, she waves it, and a paper appears. “He has an account here, but now that I’ve gotten my first job, he thinks I ought to open my own account.”

“Ah.” He reads the note. “The Quibbler. A friend of mine sent me a copy of the interview Harry Potter gave. Well, I’ll have to have this validated, but it looks as if everything is in order.”

She nods.

Raking his nail across it, he asks, “If you don’t mind me asking, what’s your job?”

“Mr Ollivander’s hired me,” she answers. “I mostly do administrative duties, but he’s teaching me a bit about wandlore, as well. I plan to write an article. Already, I have several theories about the link between nargle misbehaviour and the motivation rather than intent behind nonverbal spells.”

“Ah, you believe there’s a difference between motivation and intent? That’s an unusual belief for one so young.”

“Most of my beliefs seem to fall under that,” she replies. “Of course, there is. Just because someone intends to do something doesn’t mean a motivation is driving them to do it. Sometimes, the two can be greatly at odds.”

“That’s very true,” he agrees. “There’s no charge to open an account, which means a vault will automatically be assigned to you. Opening an account automatically gives you the right to sign and authorise stores and others to have gold transferred from your vault to theirs. There are consequences if you authorise a transfer of money you don’t have, however. Being a client means we’ll help you should you want to give or take a loan, though, there are consequences for doing bad business. All vaults automatically have agreed on protections, but you may pay to upgrade the protections if you wish. All clients must sign a contract in blood; it is magically binding,” he warns.

Withdrawing the contract from his desk and writing on it, he pushes it over. “You don’t need to sign it here. You’re free to leave with it and have whomever you wish go over it you. It’s strongly recommended that you thoroughly understand what you’re signing before doing so.”

“Would you mind going over it with me, sir?”

Smiling, he shakes his head. “Of course not, sweet one.” He directs his chair to go to her side of the desk. 

…

After they’ve gone over the contract, she says, “I’d like to sign.”

Nodding, he withdraws a quill and notices her left hand involuntarily flexing.

“Don’t be afraid, dear,” he says. “I know about Madam Umbrige’s illegal use of blood quills on Hogwarts students. This doesn’t work like that. You’re likely going to feel lightheaded for a few minutes, but there will be no pain, I promise. This quill doesn’t cut to extract blood, and it’s specifically designed to remove the blood from areas of the body that are minimally affected by the loss and that quickly replenish the supply.”

Once she signs, he refills her goblet and retrieves a package of sugar crystals from his pocket. Opening the package, he says, “Here, eat this and drink your pumpkin juice.”

After she’s done, he looks at her bare feet. “Do you have any shoes with you, Miss Lovegood?”

“No, but that’s okay. My classmates often hide mine. I can do cleaning spells on the ground and healing spells on my feet.”

“I assume you know how to ride a broom? If I get one, would you ride that? I don’t like the idea of your feet being hurt.”

“That would be kind of you, but there’s no need.”

He feels a sense of pity when he goes back around to his desk. Writing in the book connected to the vaults, he makes a withdraw from vault 318. When the Comet 260 appears on his desk, he feels a familiar pang when he sees it.

“Here you go, Miss Lovegood."

She gets out of her chair and steadies the broom midair before carefully climbing on. “Oh,” she says. “This broom has a warm history. I feel very safe.”

“That’s good.” He takes a hold of her offered hand.

They go to the carts with her riding a few feet above ground, her legs against the broom, and him holding her right hand as he walks beside it. 

…

Once they get to the vault, he hands her a key, “Once you unlock it, it’ll make an imprint of your magic. If your key is ever lost or you desperately need to enter but have forgotten it, your wand can be used as authorisation.”

“What if I have a different wand?”

“As long as the wand belongs to you, it’ll still work. The vault recognises your magic rather than the instrument which helps you channel it.”

“Then, why doesn’t Gringotts use an identification system based on that?”

“I’m afraid I can’t answer that,” he answers.

If he had his way, they would, but politics are naturally involved. The ministry wants one thing, the shareholders want another, and everyone else must deal with it as best they can.

She unlocks the door, and they both step inside. She waves her wand, and several items appear. He looks away when she starts to arrange them, but she says, “I don’t mind if you look.”

Curiosity getting the better of him, he does. There’s a picture of a dancing witch with crimped, brown hair, one of a long-haired white-haired man with silver eyes typing on a typewriter, and one of the three of them together with the father sitting on a couch and watching the woman dancing with their young daughter in her arms.

Then, his eyes land on a picture containing Neville.

“That’s Neville Longbottom,” she tells him. “And that’s Ginny Weasley and Dennis Creevey. His brother, Colin, took the picture.”

He watches Neville trying to fend off a tickle-attack from the ginger witch. The younger boy is happily eating an acid pop, and Luna is standing apart and watching the three with a fond expression.

She shows him several issues of The Quibbler. “These all have special significance to me.”

Finally, she takes a charm bracelet off her wrist and lays it on one of the issues. “That’s all for, now. Thank you very much, Teller Bornuk.”

“My pleasure, Miss Lovegood.”

…

At the end of the day, he retrieves the picture from his vault, locks his office, and leaves.

Augusta opens the door on the first ring, and a frown crosses her face. “Bad news?”

Coming in, he answers, “No. I’m here to inform you I briefly withdrew Frank’s broom. I had an underage client I didn’t want walking around underground.”

He dodges her attempt to smack him.

“I’ve told you before, I don’t give a damn what you do to the contents of the vaults,” she says. “I may not trust you to not unjustly imprison me, but I do trust you to always respect our stuff and treat it properly.”

“You being locked in was your own fault,” he retorts. “If you had listened to me-”

“I know you did it on purpose, and as soon as goblins are allowed to own wands, I’ll have no qualms with hexing you blind.”

“You don’t have any such qualms now. You merely have had the misfortune of being stopped each time you tried.”

“You’re staying for supper,” she informs him. “Neville, dear, we have a visitor!”

Neville comes bounding through and knocks over a vase. Wincing, he says, “Sorry, Gran,” as the vase repairs itself and floats back up. “Hullo, Teller Bornuk,” he says with his mother’s grin appearing on his face. He reaches out to shake Bornuk’s hand. “Are you here for supper?”

Patting Neville's hand, he answers, “I’ve been told so by your domineering grandmother, lad. It’s a shame the milklady who had your father has never appeared to take custody.”

Neville rolls his eyes. “It’s nice to have you, sir. My tiger lilies are almost ready to be transported.”

“Oh,” Bornuk says. They go to the dining room and sit down. “Why are you transporting them?”

“Luna, one of the people in D.A. with me, she’s back from where she and her dad went, and she’s gotten a part-time job at Ollivander’s. We’ve been owling some lately, and she said she was going to open an account at Gringotts. I reckoned, well, that’s kind of a big thing, isn’t it? So, I’d send her some flowers when she did. I thought about sending her a dancing sunflower, but she said that she didn’t much care for dancing.”

Cutting Neville’s meat, Augusta says with a glare, “As much as I don’t like what he and the others did, I’m glad he’s made some friends. Hopefully, this year will be a good one for him. Do you want some milk or some coffee,” she asks Bornuk.

“Just some milk, please,” he answers. “Easier to detect poison in it.”

“I’m so glad I can’t even escape stupid bickering at my own home,” Neville mutters.

“What did you say, young man?”

“Nothing, Gran,” Neville answers. He quickly takes a bite of his food.

“I know you said-”

“Tell me about your new wand, lad,” Bornuk says. He holds onto the table when Augusta kicks his chair.

Almost knocking over his goblet, Neville earnestly informs him, “It’s awesome. Gran tell him about what…”

Bornuk smiles, eats, and listens to the two.


End file.
